


Words and Choices

by entanglednow



Series: Milkshakes and Matchsticks [12]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Awkward Conversations, Communication, Dating, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Past Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-30
Updated: 2012-10-30
Packaged: 2017-11-17 08:57:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/549826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/entanglednow/pseuds/entanglednow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles has spent a lot of this relationship convinced that he's just a handful of words away from being unceremoniously dumped.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Words and Choices

**Author's Note:**

> This is the end of the series, at least for now. Huge thank you to everyone who's been reading.

Stiles doesn't think they're fighting - no, this isn't like a fight. Stiles understands fighting. Where you have a difference of opinion, or you insult someone, say the wrong thing. Or where you've been friends for so long that some days you're just sick of each other, and you poke at the vulnerable places, just because you know how. That whole moment when you brush up against someone else, sharp edges first. He gets fighting when you're in a relationship too, though Stiles has mostly been an impartial observer up until now, rather than a participant. But he's aware of how the whole making up afterwards part usually goes.

He thinks that actually fighting with Derek would be easier than this, probably. It's not like they didn't argue before they were together, responsibilities, blah, blah, blah. Scott's not your little toy soldier, blah, blah, blah. Stiles remembers those conversations really well. He knows how to be angry at Derek, because he got a lot of practice at it. He remembers what that felt like, because he was really good at it for a while.

But this isn't a fight, even when it feels like one, he knows it isn't. He just doesn't know exactly what it is. These moments where Stiles feels like he's accidentally stabbed something important, without meaning to, words going in deep where he never intended, and then splintering on impact. That's when Derek closes off and leaves. As if Stiles broke something and Derek just couldn't deal with it, had to crawl off somewhere, to sit in the dark, and growl at things until he felt normal again. Or something stupid like that - and it is stupid, because no matter how uncomfortable Derek can look, no matter how bad he is at this sometimes, he's perfectly capable of behaving like a real person when he needs to.

But whatever he does, it always leaves Stiles in this confused, hurt place. One where he still worries, where he wishes someone would just _tell him_ what the hell he did, so he can fix it, or not do it again - usually not do it again, because he thinks Derek forgives him a lot. That he keeps doing it, probably for shit Stiles doesn't even realise he did. He would never have expected that at the start, that Derek would let so much go. Stiles has spent a lot of this relationship convinced that he's just a handful of words away from being unceremoniously dumped, for being immature, or nosy, or for just talking too much. But Derek has been trying really hard to keep him around, most of the time, and Stiles doesn't get how he can be like that one minute, and just _gone_ the next.

Derek had promised they'd talk tomorrow. Which doesn't help now, while Stiles is lying on his bed, staring at the ceiling, trying to fit the pieces together when he's fairly sure that half of them are missing, feeling like crap. Also, he's wondering if they really are going to talk about it tomorrow. If they were ever going to talk about it at all. Because mostly they don't, mostly Derek cracks the door on his history just enough for Stiles to get some sort of jumbled, confused suggestion that awful crap went on, before the door slams shut again. Usually in his face.

He doesn't know if Derek was trying to do the mature, responsible thing, when he'd nearly fallen over himself to get away from Stiles as fast as possible. Because, ok, fine, he is still only seventeen. Derek hadn't said anything though. How hard is that to say? How hard is it to say 'look, I don't want to do anything yet.' It's not hugely surprising, or shocking, that he might want to wait. Because it's not like Derek hasn't been in trouble with the police already, the police who happen to also be Stiles's dad. So, yeah, maybe he's allowed to worry about that.

But how hard is it to just _say_ 'I want to wait until you're eighteen,' instead of skipping out, like Stiles had suggested human sacrifice or something - as if maybe Derek had to go home and reconsider if he even wanted to do this any more. That's what it had felt like, and Stiles gets to be angry about that. Because he's never done any of this before, and no matter how crappy Derek's other dating attempts were, he's the only one of them that has any practical experience. So why shouldn't Stiles expect Derek to maybe take some sort of responsibility here, for whatever it is they're doing.

It's not like Stiles is a child. Seventeen or not, he's pretty sure the crap they have face on a regular basis now, had beaten any remaining innocence out of him, both figuratively and literally, fuck you very much. Honestly, once you've dug up a body at two in the morning Stiles thinks you're probably ready for sex - though not at the same time, obviously. Those are two activities that shouldn't in any way end up on the calendar together. He's talking about the whole maturity thing, the realising your own mortality, birth, death, human companionship, blah, blah, blah. Stiles knows how this goes, he's read the textbooks.

If it's that - at least that would make it easier. Because they can work through that. But Stiles has this horrible feeling it's going to be more complicated than that. It always is. When is it ever that easy for them? It's like they're incapable of having a relationship like everyone else. And as much as Stiles wants to see Derek tomorrow, he's also dreading the humiliation of having to actually ask what he did wrong. He's dreading the possibility of the answer being something unexpected, and completely and totally gutting. Because it had all been going really well, he'd thought they were awesome, and he wouldn't have said anything -

He makes an angry noise and throws a pillow across the room, watches it hit the wall with a complete lack of noise or destruction, before falling in a sad little heap.

He wouldn't have said anything if Derek hadn't been - Stiles knows that Derek has intimacy issues, and trust issues, and connecting with other people issues. But he hadn't pulled away for weeks. He'd actually started pulling Stiles closer instead, and Stiles had finally started noticing all those subtle little werewolf things, that say they're totally into something. He'd thought Derek wanted it too. It had just felt right - and that's the sort of shit everyone tells you, right? That you're not supposed to feel pressured, and you'd know when it felt right.

Stiles officially hates all of those people, they're liars and he hates them all.

He gets that he's going to do stupid stuff here, because that's just what he does. He still does that with Scott, and he's known Scott for _years_. He knows he can be tactless, and relentless, and loud, and more than unbearable, sometimes. But Derek didn't have to run out of there like Stiles had suggested some sort of weird fetish or something. Something worse than a weird fetish - like Derek hadn't wanted to be around him any more.

Maybe it isn't fair to be angry about that, to be frustrated, and tired. But he doesn't care, because he wishes Derek would try talking to him for once, crazy as that might sound to him, that maybe he could try telling Stiles what he wanted, which would mean he could stop guessing like an idiot, worried he was going to poke somewhere he shouldn't. Because Derek makes it so fucking hard sometimes, and Stiles just wants them to _work_ , like everyone else. He feels a little awful about that, but since when is it so bad to just want what everyone else gets to have?

Are they ever going to get there? Or is this just a thing they're always going to do?

Right now, Stiles doesn't want anyone else though, even if it's easy. His brain has already decided that hard work, confusion and heartbreak are exactly what he needs from a relationship. Maybe it decided that years ago.

He hates Derek right now - only he absolutely doesn't. But he's seventeen years old, and he kind of wants to anyway. He's allowed to be confusing and contrary.

He's tired, and everything is a mess, and he can't sleep.

 

*****

 

Come Sunday it's raining for the third day in a row. The proper, serious sort of rain that's not screwing around, a great hammering, blinding torrent of it, when it gets up the enthusiasm. The sort you can't hear over, or see around, and it's been doing it for a while. It's a nightmare to drive in, if you have to go out in it at all. This is how apocalyptic movies start.

Stiles spends an extra minute getting wetter searching for his keys, which slip out of his fingers twice, because he can't feel them.

He ends up inside eventually, running water, shaking it out of his hair, and then squelching his way in search of the nearest towel and change of clothes. Luckily the supernatural seems to hate the weather almost as much as the ordinary people, because there haven't been any vampires, or swamp creatures, or mummies causing havoc lately. Not that he wants any of those things. He would like to make that clear to any capricious entities who may be listening to his brain thoughts. He's just saying that running around in the woods in this weather - yeah, that's not happening.

Once he's mostly dry, and his ears have regained some feeling, he digs in his bag to see if any of his stuff is a horrible casualty. Nothing's beyond help, so he throws an old shirt on the desk and leaves it all to dry, wipes his phone on his jeans, and then texts Scott to let him know he's got no plans for after school tomorrow (as far as he knows - and assuming school isn't washed away overnight.) Then he sprawls out on his bed, damp hair crushed into the pillow.

He's not texting Derek. This once, if Derek wants this badly enough he's going to have to make the effort. He'd said tomorrow, and it's now tomorrow. Stiles hasn't had a call, or a text, or anything, not even a note slipped under his door, or through his window. Nothing.

It's pretty depressing. No, it's guttingly depressing, and Stiles would kind of like to know if they're broken, so he can work out how to fix them. This middle ground where he doesn't know anything is bullshit.

The house is empty, there's nothing but the steady roar against the window pane. He lets it become background noise while he puts his laptop on charge, and drags out the books he'll need for tomorrow. Just for something to do.

Though eventually he notices a faint, clicking edge to the rain, that wasn't there before. For a second he thinks it's just hitting the tiles oddly. But he turns his head anyway, because he's gotten far too used to people showing up via the window, and sure enough Derek's just outside, running water like a drowning cat, hair plastered to his head. He looks pale, and thin, where his clothes are clinging to him. Clothes which really aren't suited to the weather at all, and Stiles doesn't even know what that's about, because it just looks dumb to be so ill-prepared for a torrential downpour - during a week of on/off torrential downpours.

Stiles is not actually as prepared to see him as he thought he was. Even though he's been thinking about it ever since Derek left. Wondering if he'd even come, and part of Stiles thinks he should be mad. Usually when he thinks he should be mad it's for a damn good reason. But Derek really does look especially pathetic against the slippery tiles. So Stiles finds himself shoving the window open anyway, fresh shirt getting spotted immediately by the rain, that's blown straight at him.

He wants to say something, he really does. Because he's been thinking up some really good ways to start this conversation, with a few choice words about Derek's failure to communicate. He'd thought they were past that. He'd thought they were past the worst of that anyway. Only Derek just looks at him, like he deserves anything - everything Stiles might throw at him, not even attempting to lean out of the rain, and Stiles can't, he just can't.

But because this isn't a sad, teen drama Stiles doesn't kiss him. No, Stiles calls him an idiot, and goes to find a towel.

When he comes back, Derek's sitting by the window, curled in on himself while he drips, as if he's trying to make as little of Stiles's room wet as possible. He should have thought of that before he climbed up the side of his house, trailing depression and werewolf angst.

"I know you're a werewolf, and you probably can't get some sort of horrible cold, but, dude, seriously. If you wander around in the rain dressed like that you deserve it." Stiles steers him a little further inside, and pulls the window shut.

"I don't actually have many other clothes," Derek admits.

Stiles already knew that, because he's seen all of them. He's personally witnessed the destruction of at least half of them. He shakes his head, and then dries Derek's hair, because it's _there_ , and it looks weird and unnatural plastered to his forehead.

"Yeah, like you'd wear a sensible raincoat, or carry an umbrella anyway."

Derek just sighs under the attention, then stares wordlessly at Stiles when he uses his fingers to try and make Derek's hair do what it usually does. With no real success. Derek lets him, even past when Stiles's fingers stop being helpful and just drag indulgently through his wet hair. Because he knows how much he'd miss this, if he didn't have it any more, and he hates how often Derek makes him think about that.

"About yesterday," Derek says quietly. "I'm sorry."

Stiles tosses the towel on the bed, uncaring whether it makes the sheets damp or not.

"I know, you're always sorry." Stiles just looks at him, then sighs when he can't hold it any more and throws his hands up. "I'm sorry too, for whatever I did. Which is getting really familiar." He sighs again, and it sounds defeated. "But I'm sorry for it anyway, I guess."

"It's not your fault. It wasn't because of anything you did, I know you don't believe that, but it's true." Derek shoves a hand through his hair, leaving it in completely new disarray. It's like the rain has stolen years off him, made him look young, and pale, and strange.

"I'm new at this," Stiles says, tired, because it isn't the first time - so not the first time they've been through this. "I don't always know what I'm supposed to want here, and I really don't know what you want. You have to tell me. Because if you don't tell me I can't know. I'm not, like, a mind reader. I know it's difficult for you, because you have responsibilities, and because of the age difference thing. I get it, y'know, I get it if you want to wait until I'm eighteen before we -" he makes an awkward sort of gesture, and he doesn't actually mean to gesture in the direction of the bed, but it sort of happens anyway. "Before we do anything, but you can just tell me you know. It'd be a lot easier. You don't have to freak out, and have me worrying for days - for fucking days sometimes - that I did something stupid. That's not cool, Derek. Because I worry, you know, about when I say something wrong. Or when I think I've said something wrong, and you leave. Or you get this look on your face like you want to. So just - I don't know - tell me to shut up. Or tell me not yet, or whatever. Just don't run away. Do you have any idea what that felt like?"

Derek's whole face winces, and it's painful to watch, it really is.

"I know, I'm sorry."

Stiles leans back against the wall, folds his arms and then curls his hands round them and squeezes. And he sucks at stillness, he does, but he figures maybe Derek will listen if he's not flailing for once. If he looks like he means it.

"I mean, you know I want to do the mature, adult thing and worry about you. Because I do, I know the sort of crap you have to cope with, and I get that you're dealing with that. But it's really hard when you're making me feel like shit, y'know. Sometimes I don't want to think about why you did it, or what I did wrong, or if I said something that reminded you of something horrible, or made you feel guilty about something. I don't want to worry about this all the time. I just want us to be good. I just want you to stop running away from me, and putting the brakes on, because there's crap in the road that I don't even know about." His voice goes frustration angry at the end, and then it just cracks off when he runs out of breath, and Derek moves closer, wet shoes making slick noises on the floor.

"I know, I know, God, I know." It starts off angry, and then goes soft and loose, and then Derek's leaning in, and his mouth is so close that Stiles doesn't even think about resisting when he kisses him. It's just one slow kiss at first. A press of damp stubble, and the tickle of wet hair against his forehead, and Stiles has his fingers in Derek's shirt, pulling on it. Until Derek's kissing him properly, hauling him close, and pushing damp hands into his hair, and under the sleeve of his shirt. "I'm sorry."

Stiles relaxes into it, because it's easy, it's always been easy. Derek kisses like he doesn't know how to stop. But Stiles has never cared, and he's sighing out something that sounds embarrassingly close to surrender.

"I'm sorry," Derek says again, quietly, soft and low, like he means it.

And then the kiss changes. Derek's hands curling tight in his shirt, in a way that's fiercer than Stiles has felt before. Everything is a little harder, a little rougher. Derek's mouth is warm and open, and more aggressive than it's ever been. Stiles's fingers end up under Derek's wet jacket, shoving it off his shoulders, until it slaps the floor. His hands keep moving, until he can lay them against the jumping, rain-damp skin of Derek's stomach. And it's good, it's better than good, it's awesome. His heart is all excited pounding, and he's suddenly warm with anticipation and arousal. Stiles didn't expect this, he really didn't expect this. For a second he wonders if it matters, because other people fix things with sex. That's what you do, you fight - or you sort of fight - but then you don't want to break up. So you do this instead. He wants to, he really, _really_ wants to. But they haven't done this yet, they haven't done anything, and Stiles doesn't want the first time they get intimate with each other to be in this confusing space, where he's still not sure what he did wrong, or why Derek has suddenly changed his mind.

But Derek is making it really difficult to think sensibly. He's making it difficult to think at all, hands sliding deeper under Stiles's shirt, easy like they touch all the time, like having Derek's palms pressed against his bare skin isn't a huge deal. Stiles's next breath lodges in his throat, and then slips back out again, thicker, and louder

"Derek." Stiles thinks that's meant to be a question, but instead it sounds desperate and overwhelmed. And he's not exactly fighting the way Derek's fingers slide up his ribs in quick, greedy pushes.

It's like Derek doesn't want to stop and take a breath, almost like this is something he needs to do, more than something he wants - and part of Stiles wants to not care about that, a bigger part than he's happy with, if he's honest. Because no one has ever needed him before, no one has ever wanted him like this, and it's _Derek_. But he's seen that look before, when Derek's trying to get someone else to do something, and Stiles gets the weird, uncomfortable feeling that this is exactly as real as when Derek was all smiles for the deputy - which is suddenly disturbing and horrible, rather than awesomely sexy. It does a damn good job of killing most of the shivery arousal that had been slow-burning inside him.

"Ok, ok." Stiles puts both hands on Derek's chest, and pushes. Until Derek takes an uncertain step back, wavering and surprised, hands falling away. "No, seriously, you're actually freaking me out now."

Derek frowns at him, like he has no idea why Stiles made him stop.

"What's wrong?"

" _What's wrong_?" Stiles says, and he thinks he does a pretty good incredulous face, with a side-order of heading towards pissed. "Maybe the fact that you're kissing me like you're a completely different person, that's a little disturbing. Or the fact that you're clearly not as into this as you're trying to be." That's the part that hurts the most.

"I am," Derek says. It sounds angry and desperate, and Stiles doesn't know which of them he's trying to convince.

"Did you think this would be easier than talking? It's really not, because, wow, I'm pretty sure that whatever we need to talk about couldn't be as painful as you trying to have sex with me when you're not really into it."

It sounds fucking awful said out loud like that. More accusation than question. Derek shakes his head like he's disputing it, like he never meant it. But there's a second of sick blankness to his face, and then he just sinks into a sit on the bed, one hand curled round the back of his neck, nails digging into the skin.

"Fuck, I'm sorry, that was - I shouldn't have done that. I just thought - I don't fucking know what I was thinking." Derek looks at him, frustration and apology fit together uncomfortably in his expression. "I just got sick of breaking this, of always being the one to break this, and I wanted to just _fix it_ for once." It comes out angry, but Derek's face just looks pale and lost now, like he doesn't even know what he's feeling any more, like he doesn't know what he's supposed to be feeling. Which is so wrong and horrible, that Stiles's anger just drops out of him, like someone cut it away.

He drifts closer, close enough to reach out and touch Derek's shoulder, heart still thumping a little too fast.

"Yeah, I think we've already proven we're not the quick fix sort. We have to do everything the hard way. So can we just stop? Could you just talk to me please, about whatever it is - so I can stop crashing into it, and getting that look on your face. Because I hate that look, it makes me feel like I've done something amazingly awful to you, and I can't get that look from you any more. Because it hurts ok. It really hurts. The fact that you'd rather do _this_ than talk about it." Stiles swallows. "Tells me it's something we need to talk about."

Derek drags in a breath.

"There's no excuse for that," he says quietly, apology and confusion, grasping for an explanation. As if he doesn't know himself why he did it.

"Would you just tell me, please," Stiles demands, and it's hard but he can't feel bad about it any more.

"It was Kate Argent." Derek stares at his hands, like he can't look at him.

Stiles is a breath away from asking what was, from asking what that's supposed to even mean. But Derek shakes his head, and drags a hand down his face.

"She was the one. The person I had a relationship with."

The word relationship rolls out in pieces, and it's like a house of cards, all coming down, so many things making sense all at once, so many fucked up things. Derek looks like he's trying to find words, but there just aren't any. There are clearly no words to explain what's happening in his head right now. Stiles barely has words himself, and the ones he does have are horrible. It's like a conversation they never had, coming together in pieces - expressions, and reactions, and emotions, and it's almost more painful for its lack of words.

"She planned it all, didn't she," Stiles says carefully. It's not a question, because he already knows, Jesus, he already knows. "Right from the start. Jesus Christ. And you never - with anyone else?"

Derek doesn't say a word, he just sits there, looking shell-shocked, like he never meant to just blurt it out like that. As if he's afraid his whole life is going to unravel behind that one thread. The last person he dated killed his whole family, and it took him eight years to try again.

"How old were you?" Stiles hears himself ask, numbly.

Derek's mouth slants into something angry.

"I was fifteen."

Which - God, that's messed up. Stiles wonders if Kate gave him a chance to say no. If he even thought he could, or if she just manipulated him into everything.

"And she made you -" he doesn't want to finish that, he doesn't even know how to finish that.

"She was beautiful," Derek says, like that's the only answer there is, for everything that happened. It's like a wound that's still bleeding, that's never stopped bleeding. "And she paid attention to me, I thought -" He shrugs. "I thought a lot of things which turned out not to be true."

Stiles shakes his head, because that doesn't answer the question he only half asked, it doesn't answer it at all. Stiles knows what it feels like to be that young. He knows what it's like to want things he's afraid of. To do things because they seem like the best idea at the time, only to realise later how insane they were, how really not ready he was for them. And sure that's mostly been about fear and violence for him. But he figures it's exactly the same for sex, and he knows from Scott that when you're a werewolf your feelings are all over the place, at least when you've been bitten.

"You know I'd never make you do anything," he offers tentatively. He's not sure he even could.

"I know that," Derek grits out through his teeth, anger wavering and restless, in a way that feels suddenly raw. As if this is a place he never wanted anyone to touch.

"I would never," Stiles adds, softer. "And even if I did, if I wanted something and you didn't, you could tell me. I wouldn't expect anything you didn't want. If I'd known, if you'd said something I wouldn't have just blurted it out like that last night. Oh my God, if you'd told me I would have asked." He would have found a better way to ask, horrible awkwardness or not. Because, for fuck's sake, Kate Argent used sex to manipulate Derek into doing whatever she wanted, when he was fifteen years old, and then killed his entire family. Stiles wouldn't have pushed if he'd known.

Derek's hands curl into fists on the damp material of his jeans. Jaw tensing like he's going to break his teeth, or half-transform and bite through his own cheek.

"Stop talking like I'm -"

Stiles puts a hand over Derek's pale knuckles and tugs, until his fingers relax and flatten out again.

"No, I'm not, I know you're not, I know. I never meant to, that's not what I was insinuating. I'm sorry, it was my fault, I guess. I just assumed that you'd want - "

"Well I don't." It's said so firmly, with a grate of anger underneath.

"Oh," Stiles says, and tries really hard to sound like he hasn't been punched in the stomach. Because that's - he wasn't expecting that _at all_ , and suddenly there's a tumbling, horrible sort of guilt inside him. Is this something he's been pushing?

Derek drags a hand through his hair.

"That's not what I meant," he says, and it's softer, all apology and quiet confusion. "Don't look at me like that. That wasn't what I meant at all. I just meant not now. Not - I want to, I do, it's complicated."

"You're not her you know. You're not manipulating me into anything." Stiles doesn't point out that what Derek had tried to do back there was pretty close to manipulation via sex. But he knows that would be the worst thing, the very worst thing he could possibly say. He flops down beside him instead, makes an abortive attempt to put an arm round Derek, and then leans back on his hands instead. "We're together because we want to be. Because I want to be."

"I know that," Derek grunts out.

"Do you?"

Derek glares at him, but it's so weak and so brief that it just looks sad.

"It's not that." He sighs out a breath, and Stiles finally gets a sense then of how hard it is for him to find the words. Of how hard it is for him to put anything into words. That doesn't mean Derek doesn't feel it - maybe it's hard for him to stop feeling it, and describe it, question it, explain it. Or maybe he wants to be strong enough not to have to. To just paper over it and leave it to fester, until it hardens into bone.

Talking has always been the one thing Stiles has never needed to be good at. It's something he just does. To the unending annoyance of everyone around him usually.

"There's a difference between doing stuff you don't want to do, because you just don't feel like doing it, and doing stuff you don't want to do, because you feel coerced into it." Stiles scrubs a hand over his hair, and wishes he knew how to phrase this better. Wishes he knew how to make it make sense out of his head. "Doing things you don't want to do because they'd straight up psychologically hurt you -" Stiles's throat goes tight. "Don't make me do that to you, ever, ok. Because that would fucking hurt me."

Derek shuts his eyes and shakes his head, frown still tight between his eyebrows.

"I'm sorry," Stiles says awkwardly. "I thought you were waiting for me to say yes. Because - well mostly because you were older than me, and even at your most socially inept you still have this thing where you look like you know what you want. And because I thought you had experience." He stops at the expression on Derek's face. "But I can wait until you want to, or until it stops freaking you out, or until I'm eighteen, whatever you want. And - and if I push you have to tell me ok, because you know what I'm like, with the boundaries, and the pushing."

"It doesn't freak me out," Derek says quietly, harshly, rubbing a hand over his forehead. "It's not that."

"Are you afraid of hurting me?" Stiles asks quietly.

"A little," Derek admits. "You're right, I don't have a lot of experience wanting things that I - of doing the things that I want." He scowls at the world in general, like he's expecting to be punished for admitting to that. "Sexually."

Stiles hadn't thought he could feel worse.

"Yeah, I'm pretty much the same," Stiles reminds him, carefully. "But you know that wasn't anything to do with you, that was all on her, and she was seriously fucked up, she was a broken human being, you know that, right?"

"I didn't then," Derek says stiffly.

Stiles wants to touch that, he does, he wants to make sure Derek believes that he didn't do anything wrong. But there's a slow tick behind his jaw, a tension in his hands. So he leaves it alone.

"So, are you afraid of hurting yourself?"

Derek shakes his head, but it's not a no, it's an 'I don't fucking know,' headshake. Like even talking about it is twisting him up in knots.

Stiles sighs.

"Do you want to stop talking about it, and get something to eat?"

Derek looks surprised, enough that he frowns, as if that wasn't what he was expecting at all.

"You're probably hungry. Getting caught in the rain always makes me hungry. You can change into one of my shirts, if you want. I'll make us grilled cheese sandwiches, and you can tell me what you do want for now, and we can work on it from there." Stiles shrugs, because Derek gets to decide this one.

Derek looks at him, as if trying to gauge if he's serious, then he swallows and very slowly nods.

"Ok," he says quietly.

"You have to promise we will talk about it though." Stiles gestures slowly between them. "That is, if you still want - with me."

"I do," Derek says, gritty and hard.

Stiles hadn't realised how badly he wanted to hear that until it's out. Because it feels like his whole spine relaxes. He stands up, pushes his hands into his pockets, and balls them into fists.

"Ok, so I'm gonna make a start on lunch, while you change - come down when you're finished."

Stiles doesn't wait for Derek to reply to that, he still has that half shell-shocked look on his face, so he's not even sure if there's going to be a reply to it. He heads downstairs pulls out bread, butter, cheese, and a pan, on automatic, and then stares at the cheese - because he doesn't know what the hell he's doing. He's pretty sure he doesn't trust himself to get this right - not the sandwich, everything else. The sandwich he can do, and for some reason that's so stupid and hilarious that he's standing there in the kitchen laughing at a pan. Until he makes himself stop.

Derek stops just inside the kitchen, which rankles, because any other day he would have come closer, settled his hands on Stiles shoulders from behind, and mocked his taste in sandwiches, or cheese, or something. Or maybe just stood there, warming Stiles's back. But instead he's staring at him, wearing his loosest shirt, which still stretches and curves over every inch of him. He looks as if he's not sure what he's supposed to be doing any more.

"You get that nothing that's happened today, nothing you've said, is going to change anything for me, right? You get that I'm stupidly fucking attached to you, and it's going to be up to you to decide when we stop being...us. Because I don't think you get that. I'm invested, ok, I'm invested to a stupid, and occasionally humiliating degree in us." Admitting that is kind of painful. But Stiles can't help it. He has to, he has to because that's the only thing he's really sure of at the moment.

He chances a look at Derek's face, which is worryingly blank right now.

"I never thought we'd get here," Derek admits at last - and there must be something on Stiles's face. Because Derek's frown goes hard, like he never meant to offend him. "It's good though, I don't want - I don't want us to finish here. But I didn't expect it, and I didn't plan for it, and I've been mostly not thinking about how I'd deal with all of this. When we got here. I'm trying, fuck, I am. You have no idea." Derek looks tired, and he shouldn't, because Stiles knows Derek can run for miles and not get tired, he can walk all the way through town, to Stiles's house, full of broken glass. He just doesn't get tired, and yet that's exactly what he looks like now. Like he's done everything he can, and he still doesn't know if it's enough.

Stiles stops fiddling with the bread, drops it and leaves it wherever it falls, so he can wrap a hand round Derek's wrist and pull. For a second Derek is completely immovable, and then he relaxes and shifts into Stiles's space, hip pushed against the counter. Stiles kisses him, one slow, careful press of mouth, it's meant to be reassuring. Something that gets across that they're ok, that they didn't break anything, and they're both in the same place they were yesterday. Only a little more careful, a little more aware of what they're trying to do, of what they need to work past. Or maybe it just says that it's completely fine to be a little messed up, because everyone is. Stiles doesn't exactly have much experience trying to say things while kissing someone. But he gets a long, slow exhale and then Derek kisses him back.

When he draws away Derek's watching him, as if he's not sure what he's going to do or say next.

Stiles figures he can defy expectations by ignoring it all. He drags bread out, makes food mostly on auto-pilot.

"So why did you decide to ask me in the first place? You never told me that."

Derek surprises him by making a low noise, that sounds a lot like a smothered laugh.

"You asked me," he says, slow and pointed.

Stiles turns and stares at him, nonplussed, holding a buttered piece of bread.

"What? When?" Because he would definitely have remembered that.

"In the woods," Derek says quietly. "That night you got drunk and I took you home."

Stiles nods, because he does remember that part. That was the night Scott abandoned him, and he drank everything in revenge, in the middle of the woods. Not one of his finer moments of awesome self-preservation.

"You said we should go out for milkshakes. You said we should skip the part where it took us ages to become friends, because you wanted to go out for milkshakes."

It sounds exactly like the sort of stupid shit Stiles would do.

"You said yes, didn't you? You told my drunk self that you would - and I didn't remember. Oh my God." Stiles shakes his head and laughs. "You really didn't have to do that. That was some sort of awkward attempt to keep your word wasn't it. Did you even want to?"

"Not at first," Derek admits. "But I didn't - I didn't really go out, with Kate. We didn't go out, it was mostly about what she wanted to do."

Stiles can tell he's not used to saying her name. Or maybe just not used to saying it when someone knew what she was to him, what she'd done. That she was the first person he - everything? Stiles wonders how anyone could ever hide that capacity for ruin and destruction. He hates her, even though she's already dead.

Derek takes his silence for...something, shoulders rolling like he's uncomfortable in his own skin, or with the skin he wore then. Stiles doesn't know how that works, when you had that much control over your own body.

"With you, it was different and I liked it. I didn't think I should at first...."

It's kind of sad that Stiles knows what he means now. He would have tried harder - or maybe he wouldn't have done. Maybe he would have messed it all up trying to be careful, and maybe he should be stupidly grateful that they got here anyway. So he doesn't say any of that, instead he plasters a smile on his face.

"I totally won you over on that first date didn't I? Man, I thought I rambled like a complete idiot. You glared at me for pretty much the whole thing, that scary glare over your milkshake. Do you have any idea how hard it was to text you back and ask you to go out again? Do you actually understand I had to give in to the temptation of temporary insanity to send that message? I thought I was mad, but figured you get these chances in life, when if you don't take a stab at the really insane things then they definitely won't happen. But if you do - well that's immediately more than zero chance."

"You thought I was the insane option?" Derek says with a frown.

"You were an angry Alpha werewolf who was way out of my league, yeah, I'm pretty sure you were the insane option." Stiles sets the sandwich on a plate and pushes it over. "But I've already proven that in my moments of madness I'm capable of throwing caution to the wind and doing the monumentally stupid things."

Derek glares at him, though there's no heat in it, just familiarity. It's an easier face than some of the others, the vulnerable, open ones. Stiles doesn't know what to do with those yet.

"Of which you are not," Stiles reassures him.

He pulls out more bread, while Derek watches him.

"So, will you tell me what you're comfortable with?" Stiles says quietly.

Derek doesn't say anything for a second, Stiles thinks he's irritated, irritated at having to be managed, that he can't just get angry and shove his way through this. But they're past that too.

"Yeah," Derek says, glares at his sandwich briefly. Stiles thinks that's all he's going to get. But Derek hasn't finished. "But you have to tell me what you want too. I know you don't want to push, but I'm not fucking delicate, I won't - she didn't break me." The anger comes through at the end, and Derek stops, takes a breath and starts again. "I just need it to be you and not -"

Derek starts pulling apart the remains of his sandwich, frustrated, and he doesn't say anything else. But Stiles gets it, he does.

He takes a deep breath, and very carefully settles against Derek's arm.

"But, just so you know, in the future, if I ask if you want to stay over, that doesn't have to mean anything other than 'stay over.'"

Derek stares at him for a second, and then nods. It's a little jerky, but it's there.

Stiles swallows and tosses his own sandwich on a plate.

"I should probably tell my dad, at some point. Which is going to go so badly, considering we've been sort of dating for nearly three months. I've been putting it off because -" Stiles pokes at his sandwich. Because he never thought they'd get this far. Because he thought maybe if he started talking about it then it would somehow stop happening. No one ever tells you that the one downside of having a supposed unattainable crush actually work out - is how fucking terrifying it is. "Yeah - but if you're sticking around."

"I'm sticking around," Derek agrees.

Stiles likes the way he says it, like it's never been in question.

"Then, yeah, I'm pretty sure I need to tell my dad. Or work out how to tell my dad anyway."

"Whatever you want." Derek says it slowly and quietly, like he means it. That whatever Stiles decides, he'll deal with.

"You know you get a choice too, right?" Because Stiles can't do this if he's constantly worrying that Derek won't. Because Stiles isn't going to pretend he's not capable of making stupid decisions too. "This is the place where we're friends as well, and you have to tell me when I'm being an idiot, and just generally veto the shit out of all my stupid decisions. Because I trust you to do that."

Derek frowns again, as if he's not sure why, or just generally confused by the whole idea.

"My choices haven't worked out so well." He makes it sound like it hurts to admit. "I've fucked up a lot of them."

"You still get to make them." Stiles says firmly. "I just want you to be honest, and I want you to make the big decisions too. I want to know that if I do something crazy and stupid, like fall in love with you -" he swallows the lump in his throat, stiff and aching. Because, yeah, if he does something stupid like that. "That you'll stick around, and we'll work it out, all of it. Even when it's hard and you don't want to talk about it. The parts where we're both a little messed up. Where you have intimacy issues, and I have - I don't know - issues where I don't think I'm good enough, and all sorts of ridiculous crap like that. Because I'm seventeen and you can't leave all this on me. You have to help, you have to want this too. I need you to want this enough to stick around, when it's really fucking hard as well. I need you to want this as much as..." he doesn't know how to finish that, doesn't know how to say what he means without it sounding stupid.

But Derek is close enough to be warmth against his back, one large hand curled round the back of his head, fingers dragging through his hair, in a way that Stiles thinks is supposed to be reassuring, but instead feels possessive, and a little desperate.

"Yeah," Derek says. "I can do that."

Stiles eats half his sandwich in silence, while the tension in the kitchen slowly sinks back to manageable levels.

"You want to watch a movie tomorrow?" he offers. "We never did get around to Alien."

"Don't you have plans with Scott?"

Stiles shrugs, because that's technically true, but he doesn't want to say yes.

"Not, like, _plan_ plans, just vague 'let's get together if neither of us are doing anything,' plans."

"Which you're going to break?"

"Yeah, I'm going to break them, say yes."

Derek smiles, like no one has even broken plans for him before. Because the whole world is clearly stupid.

"Then, yeah, I could watch a movie tomorrow. And I promise not to fuck it up this time."

Stiles makes a noise in his throat, nudges Derek against the counter and kisses him.

"You didn't fuck it up," Stiles tells him, even though he really did.

Derek makes a noise like he knows that's bullshit, but he's distracted out of it easily enough, by Stiles's careful enthusiasm and demanding fingers.

"I like having you here," Stiles admits. "I don't care what we do."

Derek makes a grumpy face, and it's kind of ridiculous that Stiles is happy to see it.

"That works both ways you know. But you don't come round much. I told you already if you wanted to, any time. I know the others can be difficult, but I like having you there. You're a part of - everything."

"I don't have anything against the fantastic four - and oh my God, I just accidentally made Peter a superhero, never tell him. But, dude, you don't have electricity at your house, or reliable running water." And because you can only pee so many times in the woods before you start examining your life choices.

"I'm working on that," Derek says quietly.

"Really?" Stiles is so surprised that it comes out before he thinks about it.

"Yes, really. It's harder to look at it now, without wanting it to be -" Derek swallows and shakes his head. "Better. Somewhere people wanted to be."

Stiles pushes at his plate, and folds his arms. Because that is a huge thing, and he's not sure that there's anything he can say to it that won't sound flippant. Contrary to public opinion Stiles knows when to keep his mouth shut and leave things alone, let them settle.

"So, Scott said the other day that the puppies are nearly weaned."

Derek frowns at him.

"No."

"What, I didn't say anything. I was just making a statement, a completely harmless statement. With no ulterior motive at all. Keeping you in the loop. Dude, you like to be kept in the loop, remember."

"I'm not getting a dog," Derek says, like what's coming out of Stiles's mouth and what Derek thinks he's saying have nothing in common at all. It's completely unfair how good Derek is getting at reading him.

"They fucking loved you man. The little one fell asleep on your big, giant, werewolf chest, like it was the best place ever. Not to mention you're always complaining that your betas need more responsibility. And, y'know, if I had to maybe come over and help you, feed the dog, and play with the dog, and walk the dog - well that would be a terrible hardship that I'd be willing to put up with, for you. Because I - because you are the best."

Derek's shaking his head, and he looks like he's on the verge of either strenuous denial, or laughter, possibly both.

"I have experience you know," Stiles adds. "Also my best friend is a veterinary assistant, and I already have a food bowl you could have. Even if it does still have 'Scott' written on the side of it."

Derek's eyebrows go up. "I don't even want to know, do I?"

"We have a complicated relationship, sometimes that relationship involves humiliation, and very poor taste." But Stiles wouldn't change Scott, not for anything. "He can't have a puppy either."

Derek pulls a face at his subtle conversation U-Turn.

"It wouldn't be safe at the house, the house isn't safe, not yet. And it would take work, to bring it up in a house full of werewolves. Who, whatever they say to the contrary, are not responsible enough, or controlled enough to deal with a puppy."

Stiles huffs out a sigh.

"Yeah, I know, I get it. I was just leaving it out there." He stretches out a hand to demonstrate.

"But you still have to come around." Derek makes it sound like if he doesn't it will be weird, and Stiles gets the feeling that there's something else here he doesn't know.

"Is this like a thing, an Alpha thing," he asks curiously. "Now everyone knows we're together, I have to come and hang around in your territory, and sort of be involved in everything?" Because Stiles has to admit, he's not hating that.

"Only if you want to," Derek says quietly, and steals the last of his sandwich. Which is going to be a thing, Stiles knows it. He's going to slowly starve to death in this relationship.

"I'm going to be unbearable, you realise that?" Stiles presses in against Derek's shoulder, and he takes his weight like it's nothing.

"It works for you," Derek says, with this horrible fake nonchalance that Stiles can see straight through. And what's churning underneath feels relieved and warm. He doesn't say a word when Derek shifts a little, until Stiles can move into the space he leaves between him and the counter.

"You want another sandwich? Because, you know, I could eat another sandwich, since I only got to actually eat half of mine."

"You know if you feed animals they never leave," Derek says pointedly, and that's definitely a joke, because Derek usually hates any suggestion that werewolves are animals.

So Stiles just nods, like he's thought about it.

"Yeah, that's kind of what I'm counting on."

 

 

 

 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [(podfic of) Words and Choices](https://archiveofourown.org/works/579572) by [neverbalance](https://archiveofourown.org/users/neverbalance/pseuds/neverbalance)




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